->         Hello Wayne ! 

->  WC> It WAS the OEM Windows software that trashed the drive.
->  
->         I doubt this unless as a coincidence the mechanics of it got
->         wrapped at the same time.

Mo coincidence and I was leery of doing the OEM install.

It failed safe on the raw drive.
Prepared for bootable FAT 32 from Linux the defective for > 64 Gig drive
Win 98 original release CD fdisk trashed it.
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5